Reunite and Rebuild
by xDemolitione
Summary: You soon find yourself holding a cup of too-hot coffee while sat impatiently on the train. You watch the buildings fly past you but you're not really paying attention, chewing absently on your lipring and ignoring the angry flash of your eyes in the window as you wonder what they all look like, now.
1. Your Best Shoes

Today was the day. You'd finally found them all.

Well technically they found you, but who even gives half a shit about the logistics of it? You'd all be together again in...

a quick glance at your watch

...Thirty-five minutes. Shit.

Your name is Karkat Vantas and you have not been late to a social occasion yet, which means you've been on time a grand total of three times in your 17 years on Earth, and you were not going to let this one break your record, no way. You check your reflection in the mirror, straightening out your grey hooded jacket a little, pulling at your sleeves and checking you have all your normal bracelets on. You pull the small silver Cancer pendant from under your black shirt and sigh resignedly. You know this is the most presentable you can look, you even have new black jeans on and so fucking what if you cleaned your nicest red converses for this, who the fuck's going to notice that?

You debate grabbing your bag but decide against it; this is only a little trip two towns over. You grab your wallet, spare set of keys and your phone and head out the door, ignoring your mother calling after you to have fun with your friends. She doesn't know. She can't ever know.

You soon find yourself holding a cup of too-hot coffee while sat impatiently on the train. You watch the buildings fly past you but you're not really paying attention, chewing absently on your lipring and ignoring the angry flash of your eyes in the window as you wonder what they all look like, now.

Maybe the humans will look the same? You hope so, you don't think you'd be able to manage if there isn't at least one recognisable face there. The train comes to a slow stop and you reluctantly stand up, feeling your blood pulse through your veins far too quickly and your legs go hollow, thudding painfully as you step onto the platform.

You check your watch; ten minutes.

You pull up your hood to cover the fact your roots are starting to show through and sip carefully at your coffee as you make your way to the park where Sollux said everyone should meet. Most of them live around the surrounding areas and the ones that don't live nearby have phones, so everyone should be on time.

You check your watch as you near the park, one minute until you're officially late. You can hear voices as you get closer, familiar voices over the noise of passing pedestrians going about their day. It's a quiet town, and the wind carries conversations over to you as you turn the corner.

There is a small crowd of people stood there, right in the center of the park, surrounding the swingset, only about five of them now. There's alot of animated conversation going on.

You throw your now-empty coffee cup away as you pass the trash can, you can hear words, now, as opposed to just generic noise.

"Ah, there he is now." You look up. Blonde female, warm smile, black lipstick. Rose. She looks exactly the same.

"Am I late?" You ask cautiously, trying not to look around at everyone too quickly for fear of passing out.

"Precisely on time." Rose smiles, and you can tell she's just as excited as you are.

You look around, now, and are surprised to see you can tell who the ex-trolls are. Rose and Jade are there, along with Kanaya, Sollux and Tavros. Tavros has legs that work. You almost grin.

You excange 'hello's and 'how are you's with everyone there, but only Jade tries to hug you. You're glad of that. Hugs might kill you at this moment.

"Everyone elth thould be here thoon." Sollux says, his lisp still present and unwavering despite the lack of fangs to influence the noise. You stand between him and Kanaya and contemplate running for it. You're terrified. You're terrified because they didn't seem that excited to see you and you were shitting yourself the entire way here about being the best fucking Karkat they've ever seen.

You guess old habits die hard, because your scowl is back and you're staring as far and hard into the other end of the park as you can.

A honk in the distance, followed by a scream, and everyone in the current group loses their cool for a grand total of three seconds while you look over, wide eyed, to see a tall young man laughing too loudly and helping an angry looking girl off the floor.

"Gamzee!" You shout, ignoring how loud you are and how Sollux tells you to shut the fuck up, "Vriska!"

They both turn to you, then, Gamzee still holding Vriska's arm after helping her off the floor, and they break into a run towards the group.

You don't mind that Gamzee crushes the air out of you, or that once Vriska reached the group she realised she didn't really have anyone to hug, so settled for Tavros.

"How the fuck are you, motherfucker?" Gamzee asks, and you both proceed to have the lamest apology-session ever concieved, and you shoosh him, because that was in the past in a different life and you can be friends again now because seriously, it'd be stupid not to.

The rest of the trolls follow shortly, Sollux telling every one of them they're late, causing Equius to flinch slightly and apologise profusely for his behaviour, which grosses you out in the best way because they're here. They're all here.

"Where are John and Dave?" Comes a quiet voice from the other side of the mass of bodies in the small park. You see a glint of red-framed glasses and realise Terezi's looking around for them, confused. She isn't blind, now, which troubles you slightly in ways you can't explain.

"Dave texted me saying he'd be a little late, but he didn't specify why. John's probably with him." Rose calls out. You shrug your hoodie up further and tune out of the conversation, edging back out of the group to get some air because okay, you'd forgotten about those two.

About ten minutes pass before Terezi calls out a shriek of glee and you see two more people making their way over to the group. A flash of a blue hoodie on one side and the glint of mirror-shades on the other. You are not standing on your tiptoes to see and you are not disappointed when they don't see you and move into the rest of the group.

The crowd disperses, sixteen people all looking the same, four as originals and twelve without fangs or horns, and skin colours varying from your palest white to Feferi's dark skin, with almost all the colours between. You sit yourself on the back of a bench, your feet resting on the flat boards as you pull your cigarettes out of your pocket and light one, surveying the area. A few ex-trolls come over to high-five you and congratulate you on not flipping your shit. You laugh halfheartedly.

"Vantas, man, you're still short as hell."

You look up, cigarette at the side of your mouth opposite your lipring, to see large shades on an expressionless face, and you smirk.

"And you're still ugly as sin, Strider. Good job you kept the shades, I think the full impact of your face would have led to a mass-suicide in this park. They would have thought we were a cult." You say, voice calm and unwavering. You find you're better at talking this way than how you were talking to the others.

"Wow, your rudeness transcends universes, too? And what is that, eyeliner?"

You look him in the eyes, then, and you can just about see their outline underneath the partially-reflective black, and you see them widen as he meets your own, unblinking, crimson irises, ringed with dark black eyeliner.

You lower your hood and look up again, the white-blonde teen looking back at you, his smirk faltering.

"I figured you'd understand. Rudeness comes naturally when it's the best defense against assholes."

"Nice roots Vantas. I am so glad you dye your hair though, I don't think I could handle you as a blonde."

"Don't flatter yourself, that's not blonde."

Dave actually laughs, then, shoving you a little as he walks away. You pull your hood back over your near-white roots and toss away your spent cigarette, making your way after him and back towards the group.


	2. Platonic Broship

The meetings become weekly, always in the same town, all starting in the park. You get to re-know everyone. John still hugs you too much despite you telling him to get the fuck off, and Dave seems to have become more accepting of you now you have a genetic defect in common. He's almost tolerable and the two of you have taken to sitting on the bench and discussing all the ways Dave hates romcoms and all the ways he is wrong.

He's so wrong. They're so good.

It's the third meeting before you actually bother to ask him for contact details.

"My chum handle's the same, unfortunately, but gimme your phone and I'll put my number in."

You spend the evenings you aren't in the park on pesterchum, and the weekdays at school texting, waiting for the next meet-up.

- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] at 22:09 -

TG: hey so what are you doing on saturday

CG: WHOA HEY, I WASN'T EXPECTING TO HEAR FROM YOU TODAY.

TG: well okay sorry ill go then

CG: WAIT, I'M SORRY.

TG: can you type in lowercase for a bit

CG: I GUESS,  
CG: SHIT.  
CG: I guess, but this feels so fucking weird.

CG: No I'm not doing anything on Saturday.

TG: you are now book your train ticket

CG: Wow, okay, what?

TG: bros out of the house for the weekend and i refuse to be sat here bored out of my skull so you're coming over

You had no choice, so you booked the train ticket for Saturday morning, and the return journey for Sunday evening. You don't complain when you have to explain to your mother that you have a friend and you're going to his for the weekend. You don't even complain when you have to get up at 5am to get the train to the city.

It's a long ride, but Dave helped with the fare so you just sit there quietly and stare out the window as the fields slowly disappear and buildings up to the sky replace them, the whole journey takes about an hour and a half and by the time you get off the train you're a little lost.

You're not tall, at all, and your grey hoodie makes you practically invisible to other passengers and you find yourself pushed and shoved almost immediately as you walk along the platform, searching for Dave. He promised he'd meet you here. What if you're at the wrong stop? You clutch your bag tightly to your chest as you push back againat the crowd threatening to trample you.

What were you thinking? You hate the city. You hate crowds. You hate people. You close your eyes just as you feel a hand grasp your arm and tug you lightly out of the stream. You look up to see shades covering half a smiling face.

"You actually rode a train for an hour and a half for me. Excuse me while I swoon." Dave says, laughing a little as he pulls you out of the busy station.

You walk to his apartment, taking the elevator up because there's like 28 fucking floors or something and he just had to live at the very top. He lets you in first, and you immediately stop mid-step as you realise you actually don't know what to do now that you're here. It's still the morning, the train ride and walking bringing the time to just gone nine.

You're tired, but you're not going to tell Dave that, it'd upset him if you just got here and went to sleep.

"You look fucking exhausted dude I'm sorry I dragged you out so early..." Dave says, wrapping an arm around your shoulder easily from his foot-and-a-quarter height advantage, "You wanna just sit and watch films for a bit? You can nap through them if you want but we're heading out later whether you're still tired or not."

"Uh, yeah, sure... I'm not that tired it's fine, films are good though?" You offer, trying not to sound like the worst guest ever.

You end up falling asleep halfway through Die Hard 2, while Dave talks and talks over the dialogue about how nobody will ever actually sit and watch these films with him because they just don't get the artistic genius or whatever, your mind is blank before you know it, warm and comfortable wrapped up in your hoodie on Dave's bright-fucking-red couch.

You're shook lightly back into the conscious world an unknown amount of time later - the film on the screen has changed, though, because you're pretty sure there were no blue opera-singing chicks in Die Hard.

You look towards the offending nudges to see Dave on the opposite end of the couch, smirking.

"Awake yet, Karkitty?" He asks, and you almost see him grin. You're curled up in a tight little ball against the arm of the couch, which is apparently funny to some people.

"What time is it?" You ask, sitting up and pretending you're not still exhausted - you're always tired these days.

"Midday, we're goin' out, come on." Dave shuts off the tv mid-film, walking out of the room before you can even straighten out your clothes.

Your trip out turned out to be a quick trip for supplies and food, followed by grabbing obscene amounts of pizza from a little faux-Italian place down the road. Dave made some decision about exactly how perfect this visit should be and you couldn't change his mind about any of it. If there was too much pizza they'd put it in the fridge, so what if you don't drink all the booze Dave's somehow bought, no biggie, Dave'll just get pissed alone during the next week. You frown at that thought but let it slide, you'll probably drink it all.

You make it back to his apartment at about 6, fully convinced that Dave had retained some of his time powers and skipped you both forwards a few hours. The sun's setting in the sky as you enter the lounge, burdened with alcohol and food and shitty films.

You start off the evening with the first Saw movie, taking one shot of whiskey every time you winced. Dave won that one, with a ratio of 1:4 on your part for being much more squeamish towards blood and wounds. Too much red for you.

By about 9pm you've ditched the drinking games, settling for just leaning on Dave's shoulder a little and swigging from the bottles. Your head's started weighing four times as much. He laughs at you, neither of you are very drunk but the whole situation right then is pretty absurd.

"Karkat... Hey, you still in there?" Dave knocks on your head and you feel the vibration of it through your skull and right down your spine.

"Whoa no no no don't even... No..." You lean back away from him, resting your head on the back of the couch and smile, "Okay that's better."

You look back to the screen as Dave gets up to put a new film in, not really paying attention until you see the title screen pop up.

"No way! No way you bought that! You're watching this willingly?!" You lean forwards, barely stopping yourself falling forwards from the momentum as you point to the open case of 10 Things I Hate About You.

"What can I say, I'm a wonderful friend." Dave says, smiling a bit too widely as he presses play. You hum in appreciation throughout the entire thing, oblivious to the boy sat beside you sneaking glances at just how happy that one simple action has made you.

You're about halfway through, where Heath Ledger is starting to realise that hey, maybe this chick isn't so bad, before you're interrupted. It's quiet at first, but a voice to the side of you stops your thoughts.

"Karkat?" Dave's talking to you, you should probably turn around, but, "Hey, Karkat..." His fingers are ghosting your jaw on the opposite side to where he is, signalling that you should probably turn around.

You give in, rolling your eyes as you turn around to see... Dave. Dave's eyes staring right into yours, not a single pair of sunglasses in sight.

"Dave?" You say, the alcohol still very much in your system and slowing your reactions slightly, "You okay?" his fingers are still there, pressing slightly, his face oddly serious compared to the smile he'd had there before, "Earth to Strider, anyone home?"

"Just shut up for a second." He says, so quietly you could barely hear him over the film, before he leans in, closing the space between you and pressing your lips together. It's gentle, less like kissing and more like when you push a couple of bits of playdough together just to see if they'll stick. You close your eyes anyway, relaxing against the touch of Dave's hand, now moved to the side of your neck. You're very aware of how drunk you both are. You don't care about the film.

Dave pushes forward once you relax, pulling you towards him and moving his hand to the back of your neck, his other hand placed awkwardly on your leg between the two of you. You lean in, reaching your arms up and around his back, digging your disappointingly blunt nails into the back of his shirt.

Oh, the damage that would have caused if you were still a troll...

He pushes you back and downwards onto the couch, his hand moving up into your hair, brushing past the areas where your horns would have been and making him pause and pull back, as if in a forgotten memory.

"I know, I'm still not used to it either." You breathe out.

"Well shit, now I don't get to rub them and see what happens."

"Shut the fuck up, Strider."

"That's more like it." Dave laughs, leaning in again and kissing you a little more forcefully now, essentially pinning you to the couch. You move your hands down his sides, pressing in at his hips and pulling him closer, tugging at the hem of his shirt.

"Bit eager, Vantas."

You shake your head at him, "You acting like a dickhead is unsettlingly not arousing, stop confusing my rewired brain."

"Okay then, here's a language both Karkats in there can understand." Dave says, pulling you up off the couch and fully into his lap, locking your lips together as he stands up, pulling at your hair with one hand and supporting you with the other as your hands tug at his shirt a little more desperately than before. You end up pinned against the wall as Dave removes the offending article of clothing, allowing you a view of very pale, very smooth skin over a toned, athletic build. Dave's alot more muscular than he seems with a shirt on and you gladly take in the sight, noticing a few striking scars across his chest and abdomen before his lips are at yours again, tugging your hoodie off awkwardly after alot of balancing against the wall and almost falling over.

You barely make it to his room before your clothes are off.

It's messy and unco-ordinated, both of you are very very drunk and at some points you're not sure if either of you really know what you're doing. The dark room blinding the two of you to where you are and what part of eachother you're grasping at, and you can't really think straight but you know it's too soon when it's over and two two of you collapse into a sweaty heap on Dave's bed, the film in the other room long forgotten, left to play to itself until the TV turns itself off.


	3. This Chapter Is Shorter Than Karkat

3

The first thing you are horribly aware of when you open your eyes to the blinding sunlight shining in through the curtains is your throbbing headache. It feels like someone shoved your ears full of packing peanuts and smacked you around with a sledgehammer.

The second thing you are horribly aware of is that you're naked. You look to the side, panicked, and see the other side of the bed empty, the shower running in the next room.

You sit upright, scanning the room for your clothes, peeling your body away from the sheets, breath coming in short bursts as you fight back a panic attack.

This is not how this should have happened.

You shake your head, burying your fingers in your hair and cursing to yourself, taking note of where your belongings are and how easy it would be to get them. You spot your bag by the wall, rushing over to it and pulling out your clean clothes, changing into them immediately and shoving your old ones in in their place. You know your hoodie will be out in the lounge but you don't know if you have time to find where Dave threw it.

"Fuck." You breathe. Closing your eyes. You didn't want this, not this way, not drunk and rushed and-

You stop. You try and clear your thoughts but all you can hear is the shower running. You move out into the lounge quietly, the door blissfully silent as you move to get your converses from by the couch, pulling them on and not bothering with the laces. You look around, not able to see where your hoodie is. Dave will find it. He'll bring it to the next meetup. It's fine. You'll be fine.

You move over to the bathroom door, leaning your ear against it and listening for a voice, anything. You hear nothing, just the unwavering sound of water rushing against tile.

You leave the apartment.

You run down the stairs for three levels before calling the elevator, not wanting the loud noise to alert Dave to the fact you've basically just run away from the visit you promised you'd make. He probably doesn't want to see you after that either. You barely remember what happened. Your lungs burn with the strain of breathing as you ride the elevator down to the ground level, pushing through the doors to the street.

All you know if you have to get home, and you have to get home now.


	4. In Which Karkat Is An Awful Friend

You have four missed calls and three texts by the time you get home. You ignore him for days. You don't read the texts before deleting them, not wanting to see what he's saying. You fucked up, you know you fucked up, you don't need him telling you.

Almost a week has passed since it happened. You haven't been concentrating at school. Your mother has tried talking to you, tried asking what's wrong, ever since you ran home on Sunday and ran straight up to your room, locking the door. You can't talk to her about it. You can't talk to anyone.

It's Friday night. You should be out with Sollux right now, but you're ditching his calls, too. You're sat in the middle of your bed with your head in your hands, watching your phone screen light up for the sixth time that evening, counting the rings before it's quiet again. You count the seconds before it lights up again. It was three the first time. Now you're up to eight. He's giving up.

You make it to thirty seconds, then one minute, then five minutes. He's not calling again. You breathe out a sigh of relief just as your phone lights up again, with a text this time, not a call. From Kanaya.

Your curiosity gets the better of you as you open it. You can't bring yourself to ignore Kanaya.

"Karkat, We Are All Eagerly Awaiting Your Arrival, If You Could Do Us All A Favour And Pick Up Your Phone, That Would Be Vantastic. ~Kan"

You smile a little at the pun, knowing that's the very reason she snuck it in, before tapping out a reply.

"Aha. Sorry Kanaya, can't come out tonight, I feel like shit. You guys have fun though, sorry for ignoring all the calls -Kar"

You wait, counting the seconds before you get a reply. Fourty-seven.

"I Am Very Sorry To Hear That Karkat, And Your Lack Of Capitals Surprises Me, You Must Be Very Ill. I Trust You'll Still Be At The Meetup Tomorrow? ~Kan x"

"Oh yeah, hadn't even noticed.. Yeah, I will -Kar x"

You add on the little 'x' because she did, and that's the polite thing to do when Kanaya sacrifices one of her x's for you.

She doesn't reply after that, and you feel yourself tense in frustration. The meetup. You'd almost forgotten.

A pinging noise from across the room forces you to look up sharply, hurting your neck after it being strained to look down for so long. Someone's messaged you on pesterchum.

You move over to your laptop without a second thought, instantly regretting it as the bright red text fills your screen.

- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering carcingoGeneticist [CG] at 21:04 -

TG: hey

TG: do you want me to bring your hoodie down tomorrow

TG: assuming youre going that is

You stare at the screen, too afraid to message back.

TG: if youre not thats fine i can look after it til you decide you want to come out

TG: but youve been ditching everyone apparently

TG: that might be my fault

You stare again, willing yourself to type back, to apologise.

TG: i guess youre busy or something

TG: but yeah just

TG: let me know if you want your hoodie

You give in, then, fingers clacking noisily over the keys, making sure to turn caps off as you type.

CG: Uh, hey.

TG: he lives!

CG: Yeah if you could bring my hoodie that'd be great.

CG: I'll probably freeze otherwise.

TG: cool yeah i will  
TG: no sense you dying out in that park just because some asshole forgot to give your hoodie back

CG: You're not an asshole.

TG: really  
TG: cause i think feel and look like one

TG: talk to you tomorrow yeah

You pause, biting your lip.

CG: Yeah.

CG: Talk to you tomorrow, Dave.

- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering carcinoGeneticist [CG] at 21:28 -

You slam your laptop shut, heading to bed and feeling more numb that you've ever felt in your life.


	5. In Which Self-Loathing Is A Thing

It's fucking freezing in the park. You know that because You're sat there in just a thin - albeit long sleeved - shirt and jeans. You were hoping Dave would be early, too, but no such luck. So you get to sit on the bench and smoke your way through a ten deck in order to regulate your core body temperature.

Not to calm your nerves, or anything.

Just for the warmth of the smoke coiling its way into your lungs.

People start arriving ten minutes after you; nobody calling attention to how cold you look. You chat with Eridan for a while, which is weird but welcome, because goddamn he looks just as cold as you do and he only asks for one cigarette. You chat about how his dad won't let him get any pet fish because "a real boy should get a real pet" and you choke for a moment at the thought or Eridan being a "real boy". He's getting a dog, soon, though. Little male puppy called Buster. He seems happy about it but makes you promise to get a pet fish so he feels better.

It's pretty far into the meet when Dave arrives, walking around the corner as if he was right on time. Everyone else has been here for about an hour already and Rose is very, very angry with him for being late.

He flinches when she storms over to him, looking around at the group, "Sorry, I... I guess I don't have an excuse."

She takes him aside to tell him off, and it seems a bit weird that she's so angry about him being a little late. Part of you wishes she'd hurry up and let him give you your hoodie already - you can see it flung over his shoulder - and part of you hopes you never have to talk to him again. Maybe you could just... sneak over and grab it off him? He's used to you being an antisocial bitch so he'd probably just accept it as normal if you took it angrily and walked off. But you can't bring yourself to stand up.

"Karkat are you feelin' alright?" Eridan asks you from his place next to you on the bench, concern evident on his just-recognisable face.

You look at him, running a hand through your hair. It desperately needs re-dying. "Yeah man sorry, just completely blanked."

He seems to accept this and just rambles on a bit longer about some app he got on his iPhone earlier, and you're glad for the distraction. He moves on to telling you about a girl he met yesterday and you're actually a little surprised at how he smiles and animates his speech and talks about her as if she's literally the only person in the world. He met her in a coffee shop and they talked for hours before she gave him her number, and then they were texting all night and you can't help but think, wow, this guy has never looked so happy ever since you've known him.

You look around and the others are all smiling and laughing, too. The ex-trolls so comfortable in themselves, so happy with their new lives on this new world, and you're suddenly very much alone. You're sat with them, you're talking to them, but you're not really where they are. You miss your horns, you miss your isolation, you miss how busy and important you were in your last life, the constant danger or being found out was a huge weight on you shoulders, but it made you who you are. You were the leader with the mutant blood, and now you are neither of those things.

Who the fuck are you?

You're some pale-as-fuck human teenager with white hair and red eyes, but this defect is more common than your blood was, and Strider beat you to it anyway and made it look so much more attractive - his lightly blonde tinted hair natural and striking, making him look so normal until you reach his hellfire eyes. You have nothing to define you. You're not Nubs McShouty - you're barely even Shouty. You've become quiet in your human body and mind, shy and conflicted instead of loud and heavily stuck in denial about your ability. You're still you, but you're barely you. You're a troll trapped in a human body. You're not happy.

Then there's Dave. You thought having your best bro back in your life would fix it, change everything and make you happier with yourself, someone to rely on and mess about with, hang out and chat about bullshit with. But you fucked that up, too. The one person who made you happy with yourself and you pushed them away so hard you don't know if he'll ever come back again.

You hate the person you've become, even more than the person you used to be.

"Hey Karkat."

You look up sharply to see that Eridan's disappeared and Dave is standing in front of you. He's wearing blue jeans, which you've never seen him in before, and a red hoodie zipped all the way up. He smiles a little warily and hands you your hoodie, which you pause before taking and pull it on over your shirt. It's blissfully warm. Dave takes this as an invitation to sit with you.

Neither of you say anything, just sit in what you can only assume to be mutually awkward silence until people start announcing they have to get home. Feferi and Nepeta leave first, with Equius trailing behind them - They all live the furthest away, it'll take them about an hour to get home. Eridan leaves next, simply due to the fact he's run out of people to talk to. Sollux, Tavros and Aradia leave after that, followed by Gamzee who ruffles your hair on his way past with a "see you soon, Karbro, thanks for showing up" and you just smile and wave. The rest of them, Kanaya, Terezi and Vriska, are all stood with the other three humans, Vriska leaning heavily on John's shoulders and chucking a set of thankfully non-magical dice in the air and glaring towards you and Dave with a challenging smile. Rose calls over asking if the two of you want to join them in the coffee shop down the road for a Dungeons and Dragons session.

Dave exchanges a look with you before responding, "Nah guys we'll catch up with you a bit later, got my phone if you need me."

Rose simply shrugs and heads off with the others, Jade throwing a concerned look at you as she leaves. You pretend not to notice. You also pretend your palms aren't sweating and you don't feel dizzy, but then Dave speaks and all you can hear is his voice and white fucking noise or something as your headache threatens to split your skull.

"I'm so fucking sorry, dude."

He says it, and in your head you throw yourself at him in a hug that knocks you both off the bench, and you cry and apologise and tell him how much you missed talking to him the past week and how shitty you feel for leaving without talking to him first and ioh god you're so sorry./i

But in reality you just shift uncomfortably on the back of the bench, squeaking your shoes on the weathered wood and biting nervously at the inside of the stud currently occupying your pierced lip. You sit in silence for far too long before Dave nudges your arm with his elbow and you have to look up, but your eyes are doing that painful dry thing and you do not want to cry because you have no reason to, but he's taking his shades off and placing them down on the bench with his bag and you can feel the liquid threatening to spill out. You swipe your now-covered hands over your face in a faux-yawning gesture, rubbing at your eyes in what you hope to be a convincing way.

"Karkat if you could talk to me that'd be awesome, you literally haven't said a word since I got here man and that's unsettling." Dave says, the concern overlaying the playful sarcasm in his voice. You look at him.

"That's not how I wanted that to happen." You force out, "But that's not your fault and I shouldn't have ignored you. It was shit of me."

You don't outright apologise but he can hear it in your voice. You don't need to say it for it to be true.

"I'm such a shit friend." He laughs, then, and the sound is abrupt and wavering and he covers his face in his hands, and soon you're laughing too because this is such a shit situation.

"iYou're/i a shit friend? Who ran out of who's house again? My morning after etiquette is fucking ridiculous man, I'm the shit friend here." You laugh, bumping your head on his shoulder and making him laugh more.

The two of you calm down after a short while, sitting in moderate silence again before Dave says, "This is so fucked up, Karkat." and your heart stops again.

"Yeah." You agree, "But that's basically a short summary of our lives up until this point, isn't it?"

"Accurate man. You wanna go hang out with the others before we turn this reunion into a cryfest complete with you freaking out because your tears are clear?" He asks, and you smile at him as he meets your gaze with his own. All you have to do is nod.

On the way to the coffee shop - after five text exchanges with Rose demanding to know what kept you so long - you speak up a small but prominent worry.

"Are we still-"

"Yeah, Karkat," He sighs, shoving you towards the next lamp post you pass, "We're still bros."


End file.
